House bill wants $5,000 fine for video games without ESRB rating

Act would also prohibit selling AO- and M- rated games to minors.

Another year, another congressman proposing legislation demanding some sort of label on video games. This time around it's Rep. Jim Matheson (D-Utah), who introduced HR287, the Video Games Ratings Enforcement Act for consideration by the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee.

The act as written would require all games sold at US retailers to have a "clear and conspicuous" rating label from the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB,) and to give customers information on what those ratings means. This portion would have little practical effect on the state of the game market, as most major retailers already refuse to carry games that don't sport an ESRB rating (and, thus, almost all retail games carry such a rating). But it would make failure to comply a criminal matter rather than an issue of internal industry enforcement.

The second portion of the act would prevent retailers from selling AO-rated games to buyers under 18 and M-rated games to buyers under 17, as suggested by the ESRB. Again, most retailers already comply with this voluntarily, but this section of the law also seems to directly contradict the landmark 2011 Supreme Court ruling that overturned a law imposing similar content-based sales restrictions on games in California.

That ruling not only found no "longstanding tradition in this country of specially restricting children's access to depictions of violence," but deemed restrictions on video games alone "wildly underinclusive" when other media are not similarly constrained. This act differs slightly, though, by using the industry's own ESRB rating system as the guideline for the restrictions. In the California case, sales were restricted for games that were considered "ultraviolent," as determined by a government board.

Under the act, the Federal Trade Commission would be responsible for enforcing penalties of up to $5,000 per violation.

The new act takes a different tack than the previous Violence in Video Games Labeling Act, which tried to impose a Surgeon General-style warning on almost all video games stating "WARNING: Exposure to violent video games has been linked to aggressive behavior." That act, sponsored by California Democrat Joe Baca, failed in 2012, 2011, and 2009. If we had to guess, we'd say the new act's chances for passage are similarly dim, even with the increasedattention game violence has been getting in the wake of the Sandy Hook tragedy.

Promoted Comments

erm, would this not make a criminal out of anyone who wrote a "video game" for iOS or Android and submitted it to an app store? What about a Flash game? The Snake clone written by a 15-year-old I saw this morning or the small MUD I hacked on back in the day? The easter egg games built into MS Office? While major games are already rated by the ESRB, there are certainly thousands of indie developers churning out games that never have been rated and never will be. Since the bill has no definition of "video game," there's no reason to believe that it would only encompass big budget console titles.

"(a) Conduct Prohibited.--It shall be unlawful for any person to ship or otherwise distribute in interstate commerce, or to sell or rent, a video game that does not contain a rating label, in a clear and conspicuous location on the outside packaging of the video game, containing an age-based content rating determined by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board."

What if a game doesn't have outside packaging?

This whole thing is term filler. Nothing about it would stand up to court challenge and it wouldn't stop anything to begin with. The only people who would possibly be in violation of this to begin with would be tiny brick and mortar game stores. It hurts indie developers less than previous comments would indicate since the majority of any indie distribution I see is digital, and this specifically calls out retails selling games not bearing the appropriate stickers on outer packaging.

"any person who violates section 2 or 3 of this Act shall be subject to a civil penalty of not more than $5,000 per violation."

How are you even going to enforce this? Are you going to enact a special task force to go around running sting operations on independant game stores? "That'll be $4.99" "NOPE! THAT'LL BE FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS, SUCKER!"

This is a bad idea because it gives a lot of power to the ESRB, which is not actually part of the government. ESRB doesn't like you and refuses to rate your game? Well now it is illegal for you to sell it. This sounds like a first amendment violation committed to paper.

This is a bad idea because it gives a lot of power to the ESRB, which is not actually part of the government. ESRB doesn't like you and refuses to rate your game? Well now it is illegal for you to sell it. This sounds like a first amendment violation committed to paper.

That's because it is. It would be like fining comics that didn't carry the Comics Code Authority seal back in the day, and banning the sales of them to children. Which is also an old moral crusade against an entire medium that failed. It's basically some legislator trying to step in and punish independent artists, developers, and publishers who don't side with the leading trade group. A trade group that isn't even part of the government in the first place.

Yeah, this is dead in the water. It might make it out of committee, but I have a hard time believing it would get past the full HoR, never mind the Senate and then getting signed into law by the President. You'd think someone along that path would bring up the dozen or so similar state laws that have been utterly crushed by the courts, and the mountain of legal precedent against a bill like this.

Legally binding ratings should be done by a government department, not a private organisation. They're walking into the same trap as with movies where the MPAA decides on classification and refuses ratings to independent filmmakers if they don't like their work for some reason (i.e. a form of anticompetitive behaviour).

In the UK (as in most other countries), legally-binding ratings for movies and some games are done by the BBFC, which is part of the Department of Culture.

Oh look its not just the repubs who pull BS. Almost every one of these bills aimed at video game censoring is introduced by Democrats, see the (later defeated on appeal to SC) one that they passed in Califonia.

Even if this WASN'T an abysmally stupid, almost certainly unconstitutional move, what exactly was Matheson hoping to accomplish with this bill? Let's say that by some unholy disaster this thing passed - who is it supposed to affect, exactly?

I say we put Matheson on the spot here: if he can name a SINGLE non-ESRB rated game sold through retail channels in the past decade, good for him. If not, he should be out on his ass for being terrible at his job.

Unless they want to throw away the Constitution, or assassinate and replace the Supreme Court, this law will get slapped down. But I guess it makes the Politicians drafting it look good to the idiots who vote for them.

"WILL SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN!" The cry of the modern politician as they trample your constitutional and civil rights.

Oh look its not just the repubs who pull BS. Almost every one of these bills aimed at video game censoring is introduced by Democrats, see the (later defeated on appeal to SC) one that they passed in Califonia.

So your point is that all politicians are assholes? So what? Who didn't already know that?

erm, would this not make a criminal out of anyone who wrote a "video game" for iOS or Android and submitted it to an app store? What about a Flash game? The Snake clone written by a 15-year-old I saw this morning or the small MUD I hacked on back in the day? The easter egg games built into MS Office? While major games are already rated by the ESRB, there are certainly thousands of indie developers churning out games that never have been rated and never will be. Since the bill has no definition of "video game," there's no reason to believe that it would only encompass big budget console titles.

Back in the day I considered making a Counterstrike map based on the layout of my college's indoor multipurpose arena. Ultimately I decided against it. Partially because of the history of school shootings (though that was mostly HS at the time) and poor mapping skills.

Perhaps it's time to consider taking a whack at it again. This time with the US Capitol Building as its layout. Perhaps design a new mode: anti-VIP?

I'm seriously getting tired of elected officials that can't seem to know the difference between their assholes and reality. Knee-jerk reactions, out-and-out lies and rampant corruption are only a few of the problems those bourgeois mud-humpers have.

Can we at least call for a vote of no confidence on the entire US Government?

This sounds more like a publisher wanting to squash indies and using a moron to do it.

Then its a dumb way to do it since the majority of indie titles are not sold at retail. I would argue this is part of the distraction that was mentioned earlier, coupled with representatives giving the impression that they are doing something.

Fundamentally, its bad because this type of legislation has already been smacked down elsewhere, but peripherally its bad because it takes attention away from things that could make bigger differences like improvements in mental health services.

This portion would have little practical effect on the state of the game market, as most major retailers already refuse to carry games that don't sport an ESRB rating (and, thus, almost all retail games carry such a rating).

Actually, a lot of indie games are unrated (since it costs money the developers may not have), as a result, there are a lot of games on Steam that don't have ratings.

Yeah, this is dead in the water. It might make it out of committee, but I have a hard time believing it would get past the full HoR, never mind the Senate and then getting signed into law by the President. You'd think someone along that path would bring up the dozen or so similar state laws that have been utterly crushed by the courts, and the mountain of legal precedent against a bill like this.

I'd call it highly likely that the full congress and president would sign ridiculous legislation (not specifically this) to limit your freedoms, but that's why we have a third branch of government that interprets laws the other two branches put forth, and rejects those that don't pass Constitutional muster.

Oh look its not just the repubs who pull BS. Almost every one of these bills aimed at video game censoring is introduced by Democrats, see the (later defeated on appeal to SC) one that they passed in Califonia.

As someone who lives in Matheson's district, He's no Democrat. I'd say that these video game bills are usually sponsored by the "middle ground" politicians, like Matheson, who think that government should do something, but do it half-heartedly, and therefore poorly. I mean, using a private industry's rating system is a poor plan for fines and sales restrictions, as anyone who is into the movie industry knows. The ESRB has a pretty awesome ratings system that is clear and understandable (mostly), but tying fines and sales restrictions to games will only lead to tampering with that system and breaking its currently working status.

Oh look its not just the repubs who pull BS. Almost every one of these bills aimed at video game censoring is introduced by Democrats, see the (later defeated on appeal to SC) one that they passed in Califonia.

I don't disagree with you but I would like to point out that "D-Utah" == "R-EverywhereElse".

Yeah, this is dead in the water. It might make it out of committee, but I have a hard time believing it would get past the full HoR, never mind the Senate and then getting signed into law by the President. You'd think someone along that path would bring up the dozen or so similar state laws that have been utterly crushed by the courts, and the mountain of legal precedent against a bill like this.

I'd call it highly likely that the full congress and president would sign ridiculous legislation (not specifically this) to limit your freedoms, but that's why we have a third branch of government that interprets laws the other two branches put forth, and rejects those that don't pass Constitutional muster.

I really hope Obama wouldn't sign this bill. He has a law degree, and taught constitutional law. You would hope at least he would be smart enough to look at the recent case files and realize that it would be a gamble.

Anyone else feeling a bit miffed that some dumbass member of congress has time to take this up when there is actual important work to be done in Washington? Seems like his priorities may be a little out of whack.

If for some crazy reason this passed, I wonder how it would impact indy games on the various app stores. I know the big publishers have their ESRB logo on the app store listing, but many indy games don't.

This portion would have little practical effect on the state of the game market, as most major retailers already refuse to carry games that don't sport an ESRB rating (and, thus, almost all retail games carry such a rating).

Actually, a lot of indie games are unrated (since it costs money the developers may not have), as a result, there are a lot of games on Steam that don't have ratings.

So really, all this does is harm indies.

I came into the comment section to ask exactly who this harmed seeing as I've never bought a game without an esrb to my knowledge. Thanks for reminding me though, it must have slipped my mind about indies.

"(a) Conduct Prohibited.--It shall be unlawful for any person to ship or otherwise distribute in interstate commerce, or to sell or rent, a video game that does not contain a rating label, in a clear and conspicuous location on the outside packaging of the video game, containing an age-based content rating determined by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board."

What if a game doesn't have outside packaging?

This whole thing is term filler. Nothing about it would stand up to court challenge and it wouldn't stop anything to begin with. The only people who would possibly be in violation of this to begin with would be tiny brick and mortar game stores. It hurts indie developers less than previous comments would indicate since the majority of any indie distribution I see is digital, and this specifically calls out retails selling games not bearing the appropriate stickers on outer packaging.

"any person who violates section 2 or 3 of this Act shall be subject to a civil penalty of not more than $5,000 per violation."

How are you even going to enforce this? Are you going to enact a special task force to go around running sting operations on independant game stores? "That'll be $4.99" "NOPE! THAT'LL BE FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS, SUCKER!"

what is the definition of "retailer"? there's a lot of indie games on Steam with no ESRB rating.

Not only that, but what about the thousands of games on the apple store or google store. These are technically video games too.

Google and Apple have their own ratings systems due to the fact that a functional phone app can be written in about 2 hours, in a 8-hour work day, theoretically, someone could pump out 4 apps a day, which would be 20 apps a week. Let's just say there are 500 people churning out apps at this pace... that's 10,000 apps in a week. Do you think the ESRB has the manpower or resources to review 10,000 apps every week? No. That's why Apple has their chart, where they tell Apple what's in the app, and Apple, when they approve the app, basically just check to make sure the chart isn't inaccurate and that the app is "safe" (not a virus). I don't know off the top of my head what the Android process is, but the Apple one was highlighted in the article.

Hmm, a Democrat this time. Let's see if it garnishes the same types of vitriolic attacks that a republitard proposing this would?

Also, I notice that there are a whole lot of "Well they better want to change the Supreme court or constitution" arguments being made about this law, but none of those arguments are being made about the various gun control legislation being bandied about despite equal Supreme Court ruling and Constitutional protection.

Oh look its not just the repubs who pull BS. Almost every one of these bills aimed at video game censoring is introduced by Democrats, see the (later defeated on appeal to SC) one that they passed in Califonia.

He's from Utah, I'm pretty sure even the Democrats are conservatives there...

Kyle Orland / Kyle is the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica, specializing in video game hardware and software. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He is based in Pittsburgh, PA.